countersword count
The journal I am submitting to requires a count of the words on the title page. I can of course run texcount on the .tex document and put the number in, but it seems that I should be able to automate this.
For tables and figures (which are also required), I can simply use the totcount package. Is there something equivalent for words? Or can I store the output of texcount in such a way that I can call it on a subsequent pdflatex run?
You can use texcount to count the words. It automatically produces subcounts for the sections.
Here's a new macro that calls texcount, extracts the subcount for the current section, and then inserts the word count into the document. It requires write18 to be enabled, and texcount must be in your path (or you have to include the full path to the executable in the macro).
\documentclass{article}
\newcommand\wordcount{
\immediate\write18{texcount -sub=section \jobname.tex | grep "Section" | sed -e 's/+.*//' | sed -n \thesection p > 'count.txt'}
(\input{count.txt}words)}
\begin{document}
\section{Introduction}
In publishing and graphic design, lorem ipsum is placeholder text (filler text) commonly used to demonstrate the graphics elements of a document or visual presentation, such as font, typography, and layout. The lorem ipsum text is typically a section of a Latin text by Cicero with words altered, added and removed that make it nonsensical in meaning and not proper Latin.
\wordcount
\section{Main Stuff}
Even though "lorem ipsum" may arouse curiosity because of its resemblance to classical Latin, it is not intended to have meaning. Where text is comprehensible in a document, people tend to focus on the textual content rather than upon overall presentation, so publishers use lorem ipsum when displaying a typeface or design elements and page layout in order to direct the focus to the publication style and not the meaning of the text. In spite of its basis in Latin, use of lorem ipsum is often referred to as greeking, from the phrase "it's all Greek to me," which indicates that this is not meant to be readable text.
\wordcount
\section{Conclusion}
Today's popular version of lorem ipsum was first created for Aldus Corporation's first desktop publishing program Aldus PageMaker in the mid-1980s for the Apple Macintosh. Art director Laura Perry adapted older forms of the lorem text from typography samples — it was, for example, widely used in Letraset catalogs in the 1960s and 1970s (anecdotes suggest that the original use of the "Lorem ipsum" text was by Letraset, which was used for print layouts by advertising agencies as early as the 1970s.) The text was frequently used in PageMaker templates.
\wordcount
\end{document}
Your MWE will not work without \protect. Earlier I had no idea that you are using hyperref. Your MWE works in the following form:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{hyperref} % It does work even with hyperref.
\usepackage{totcount}
\newtotcounter{TPWRD}
\begin{document}
\tableofcontents
\section{Journals \texorpdfstring{\protect\total{TPWRD}}{}} % Works only with \protect and also with hyperref
\stepcounter{TPWRD}
\stepcounter{TPWRD}
\stepcounter{TPWRD}
\end{document}
PS: By adding a full MWE with your question, you will be helping us to avoid wasting time and the probability that you will get an accurate answer, also increases.
Best Answer
Here is the solution using bashful. Note that you need to run
latexorpdflatexusing-shell-escapeoption